Yr1 phonics check

[shoelaces]

How does your school tell you the results?

I know/hope they would contact me if they had concerns. But is that it? Is it normal to not know anything at all?

Not even a note saying well done/brag/boast our school/class average was x

Sending home lists of pseudo words completely defeats the purpose of the screening check

Hi mrz, long time no see!

Yes I agree with you, no point of practicing for PSC.
But I also think if they use the homework in the right way, as in identifying gaps of phonics knowledge of a child, you don't need to wait until certain time of yr1 to identify which child is having a problem with phonics, and to what extent.

I always saw the pseudo words as a game of ‘name that alien’

Gotta agree if you’ve missed the fact one of the children can5 read for two years there’s issues

Can’t

I would hope that if the school are teaching well, there shouldn’t be any children for whom the test throws up a major unexpected issue even without sending home lists of pseudo words. It really isn’t necessary.

Hadn't realised we were supposed to be given the score. We were just told it was a pass

Couldn't agree more, Rafa.
But reality is, we see so many phonics teaching related thread on here by worried parents. Some are aware, and seek help outside school. But I assume a lot of parents aren't aware of the fact that their dc's school's phonics teaching isn't effective.
At least it's a indicator, that sending home list of words to practice for PSC is, that school isn't confident about their teaching.

I think it might have a much to do with a bizarre preoccupation for preparing for tests by practising lots of tests. Although there’s probably a significant minority who don’t really understand the purpose of the check.

Identifying gaps in a child's knowledge and skills is important but sendings home lists of pseudo words isn't a useful method.
Children may appear to read well and not have an effective strategy for tackling unfamiliar words which is why the check is needed. Historically many children hit a wall around Year 3 or 4 when these issues became apparent.

We got the annual reports last Friday. My DD's score was shown in the annual report. She got 40 but nothing was said about what the pass mark was for this year. The Headteacher will give us a summary of the schools performance (percentage of those who passed and those who failed) at the start of the school year in September during the annual year ahead meeting.

We got a letter home from the school with their mark (39/40 for July born DS) but we already knew as he was confident he got all but one right. it didn't say a pass mark but having read here it has been 32 for a number of years.

Some children who are considered to be 'good readers' in Y1 aren't as secure in their phonics as is thought. They store a lot of words as whole chunks in their memory.

The limitations of this often don't become apparent until Y3 or so when the child 'runs out' of memory space and doesn't have the phonic knowledge to tackle unfamiliar words.

This happened to the daughter of a friend of mine. After doing 'okay' during KS1, she plummeted academically in Y3 and Y4. After various assessments for dyslexia etc, it was discovered that she had a very poor grasp of phonics, so was remembering rather than decoding.

She had an intensive phonics course and went up about 5 NC levels (old money) in a year.

It would have been much better for her academic progress and self-esteem if her lack of phonic knowledge had been identified when she was at the end of Y1 and supported during Y2.

Strikes me that if a year 1 is managing to fake good reading without having an approach to unknown words they're probably not being given the right level of reading books. DC are well beyond good year 1 level and still occasionally come across words that they don't know and of those occasionally decode feasibly but wrong. (So do I come to that, foreign names etc.)

It's not about 'faking good reading'. It's about having sufficient memory to store lots of whole words.

If children aren't able to decode, this will show up in the phonic screening check, and should be addressed in Y2.

I mean that storing lots of words doesn't fool a teacher that they're decoding, because as soon as an unknown word comes up they fall apart. It shouldn't take the phonics test to spot that. Unless they're being given very simple books where there are no unfamiliar words. Probably old look and say books because phonics books even at basic levels tend to have some odd words or made up CVC names or something.

But it did convince teachers/parents etc that the children were reading more effectively than they actually were.

Many schools were teaching a variety of 'mixed methods. Hence, only 58% of Y1 children nationally 'passed' the phonic screening when it was introduced in 2012.

This figure rose by 11% the next year, as schools became better at teaching phonics, and has continued to rise.

There are fewer children going into KS2 and beyond without a solid grasp of phonics, which is the most effective way of learning to read long term for most children.

This is what I fear is going on with DS and I've said as much to his teacher back in sept . He's reading level is 2 years higher but he uses a combination of memory and context. He will repeatedly use the wrong sound in an unfamiliar word if he is guessing.

Ie if the page has a picture of a submarine and the word says 'peculiar'. DS will guess periscope then pesci-lope and other made up words because he cannot see past the obvious word being periscope and does not/can not see the sounds in the word.
Hopefully I will get more answers when I meet with school about it.

What year is your ds in?

Do the school use a phonic based approach (they're meant to), or 'mixed methods'?

It's great that you've recognised it, and not got caught up with 'he's a good reader because he's two years ahead'.

He's yr 1 and I should be getting his phonics screening result as part of this meeting. I did last years test with him in sept and he got all 40 right. I think because they are all simple length words. He gets caught by 3 syllable words where he uses context and pictures plus the dominant letters in the word.

The use mixed methods and books that are literally from the 70's and 80's. In reception I was supplementing with Songbirds and Biff, Chip and bloody Kipper that we're newer ones with Floppy's phonics. I then donated them to the school once done!

I'm just frustrated at being told there are no issues when I can see them.

I think the teachers have to tell you the score if you ask for it explicitly.

One of my twins failed the phonic screen in Y1 - we weren't told the score just that she had failed.

She could not get her head around why she had to read 'fake' words and was trying to make them into real words.

She passed it when they re-did it this year and also has scored "exceptionally well" in the Y2 SATS for reading according to the report we received yesterday, again no idea of how she actually scored but failing the phonics screen in Y1 was not an indicator of how well she could or couldnt read at the time.

Eloise, they have to tell you your child's actual score and the pass mark. It's a statutory requirement.

Unintentional, you're right that failing the phonics screen in Y1 was not an indicator of how your (or any child) could read at the time. That's because the phonics check is not designed to be a reading test. It's designed to check their decoding, their phonics knowledge. The purpose of the 'alien' words is to separate decoding from word recognition.

Shoelaces is right to be concerned, as it's clear her DS's school are using mixed methods and it's failing him at this stage, despite her best efforts to supplement his reading in reception.

LetItGoToRuin Section 9.2 of assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/651757/2018_KS1_Assessment_and_Reporting_Arrangements__ARA_.pdf for those who like to read govt documents.

Section 9.2 is the wrong section. You want 7.9. This is the section about the phonics screening check and says that schools must report the child's score to parents by the end of the summer term.